Want to know the real secret to great advertising? It isn't clever technique. It's great products.

When you start with something truly valuable, you give yourself a tremendous advantage when it comes time to write copy, design graphics, and create broadcast spots. My personal experience is that when you have an exciting product, the ads seem to write themselves.

The more lame the product, the more you have to rely on tricky techniques and find clever ways to get people to turn off the logic circuits in their brain.

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I got a mailer today from a bank. The offer was pretty good: a free transfer service to make moving your accounts easy. For years, I've encouraged banks to make that offer, so it's nice to see someone finally take my advice.

But despite the compelling offer, the copywriter obviously caved in to the wishes of management and filled the mailer with tons of facts about the bank and relegated the unique transfer service to a short sentence at the end.

If I could wave my magic wand and change one thing about all copywriting everywhere it would be to make copywriters understand that focus always makes copy better. Rattling off a dozen ideas does not make your copy a dozen times stronger. It makes your copy 1/12 as strong.

Every advertisement should push one big idea. In this case, it's the account transfer service. Focusing on one idea lets you explain it, dramatize it, and make it desirable.

And it's the job of a competent copywriter to recognize a big idea and push back against management when they try to bury that big idea with lots of empty corporate fluff.

ARTICLE

Boost Profits with Cheaper Direct Mail Formats

One of the beauties of direct mail is that it allows you to send prospects just about anything you can print. In addition to the standard envelope package, there are plenty of alternative formats you can test. Often, your response will be lower with these formats, but the idea is to lower your costs while maintaining enough response to offset the difference and net more profit.

Reduce costs with a self-mailer. It offers low-cost and a quick read, good for quickly-recognized content. It also helps speed response, because it's not as in-depth as a full package and looks more urgent and newsy. To make a self-mailer work at peak efficiency, combine elements of a standard direct mail package and a print ad, including:

Plus, a feature list, testimonials, guarantee, and other elements as needed

Signal exclusivity with an invitation. To make an offer special, you can issue an invitation in the appropriate format, usually a smaller envelope and letter on higher-quality paper with an RSVP. This works best for offers targeted to higher-income prospects, professionals, and executive level positions; for events such as conferences, meetings, and presentations; or for offers that need a quality feel.

Add urgency with a telegram. This is a good idea that is, unfortunately, wildly overused. It can be little more than an envelope design, such as "Urgent Gram," "Speed Gram," or some variation. Or it might be an envelope and letter combo resembling an actual telegram printed on yellow paper with tractor-feed holes down the sides of the letter. One way to make this format work is to create your own urgent-looking envelope for fulfillment materials. This allows the envelope to get noticed, which is the whole point, and assures that the contents will be relevant and interesting, instead of boilerplate.

Create an official look with a snap-pack. This format is often used for official notices or statements, so it gives your ad message the same feel. And because the recipient has to rip open the edge of the envelope and pull out the contents, it is naturally involving. It's good for generating inquiries or for organizations with recognizable and trusted names. It has been used with particular success in the nonprofit sector to deliver what appears to be an urgent, cheap appeal for funds.

Generate quick leads with a postcard. Direct sales are possible with postcards, but only for simple offers, such as magazine subscriptions. They are much better for building traffic for local retail or for generating inquiries for familiar services, such as real estate or carpet cleaning. However, because response is so easy, lead quality is often low. But it's worth testing. Just remember to telegraph your message: clear benefit headline, strong tangible offer, a picture of what you're offering, lean copy, and a bold call to action.

Use dimensional mailings cautiously. Boxes, bags, tubes, folders, and other unusual formats are great for getting attention. But while there are plenty of examples of successful campaigns, these formats are usually misused, wasting money on a novel format when a standard format could deliver a more powerful message and net a greater response or profit. Most of the dimensional mailings I have seen are simply a way for ad agencies to jack up their fee and cover up the fact that they don't have anything to say about a product or service.

When in doubt, use an envelope package. The classic direct mail package consists of an outer envelope (usually #10, 6"x9", or 9"x12"), a letter, brochure, reply card or order form, maybe one or more inserts, and a reply envelope. The reason this format is a standard is that it has been developed, tested, and perfected over many years. And it works. Test other formats, but don't be different just to be different.

Test formats head-to-head. The important point in format testing is to keep the offer, copy, graphics, and all creative elements as similar as possible so that you are testing the format itself and not a new creative treatment. And always test a new format in a head-to-head mailing with the old format. Never make a change until you have proven results.